Fate In A TrenchCoat
by trycee
Summary: Scully has to deal with her guilt over the past with Daniel and Maggie. This is from ALL THINGS, Episode 7.     This is Angst. This is my interpretation of what she's thinking and feeling throughout the episode and why she does what she does in the end.
1. Chapter 1

Fate in a Trench coat

by Trycee

Time Frame: All Things, Season 7: Scully has to confront her guilt over the past.

Disclaimer: I do not own the X Files, its owned by Chris Carter and Fox. I wrote this for fun not profit.

I was just thinking of how angry I was with Mulder. I was thinking how angry he makes me sometimes when he doesn't get my hints...why after all this time does he not understand my feelings for him, but not just that...why doesn't he understand that I want more than running off to England for some damn crop circles...I want him but I want him outside of the X-Files...I want to settle down and I don't think he'll ever get to that point. Meanwhile we're getting older and more frustrated and life is passing us by. Sometimes I just want to hit him when he doesn't understand my need to slow down...I want a life with him, together as a couple, I want more than to be his FBI partner and friend. Will he ever grow up? Thats what I was thinking when it happened...the mix up of the files in the hospital, learning that Daniel was there...he wanted to see me... and the _anger_ in Maggie's voice on the phone brought me back to the shame, all the pain and emotions I felt from the past...

Maggie and I had been best friends, we shared time together all through medical school. She was as close to me as Melissa... When she introduced me to her father, my upcoming professor, sparks flew...it was instant, a handsome man and a young me...we kept our relationship a secret because he was my professor, my mentor, but also because we didn't want Maggie finding out. I felt guilty but it was exciting too...doing something I wasn't supposed too...How could I tell her that her father had been what I wanted... He was a handsome man then, older, wiser, powerful which had always attracted me. Oh, the guys all through college and even in medical school wanted to date me but I was always drawn to older men...the therapist said that though I was a confident, professional, independent woman, I was drawn to older powerful men because I was always trying to compensate for my need for approval from my Naval captain father. There may be some truth to that...I suppose...all the men that I have loved including Mulder, I had been solely devoted too and were usually older and in a higher position than me...

I was looking for love back then and I saw it in this older man that made my head swirl. I was young and he was very knowledgeable, very powerful and I was drawn to him. How could I tell Maggie I was attracted to her father? How could I tell her that we had fallen deeply in love, not like the boys I had dated previously, this was a man that knew what he wanted and he wanted me. He promised devotion to me and he promised me children... children running at our feet, the whole fantasy of seeing my parents with they're grandchildren, red headed little monsters that would've filled my life with joy. He promised me things I had dreamed of as a little girl, to be a prominent doctor with a successful husband as well...he made me believe it was all possible. And then my world came crashing down...Maggie caught us outside the restaurant we were entering for a dinner date...she was just picking up take-out, and she screamed out at me that he was married..._MY GOD, married..._My world in one swoop had ended. I crumpled to the ground crying, disgusted with myself, ashamed of us...I was so naïve back then. I always felt guilty not only for sneaking around behind her back but because of our affair she had dropped out of medical school. I immediately stopped seeing Daniel, cursing the day I had ever met him. I had deceived Maggie and had been a mistress though we hadn't become intimate, I was still the 'other woman' and I knew that my parents would be so disappointed in me if they knew. Good Catholic Girls don't become Home Wreckers.. He tried to convince me to stay, he tried to convince me to stick to medicine, but instead I joined the Academy and became an FBI agent where I met Jack and tried my best to forget Daniel...and then later came Mulder, thats why it took so long..._its still taking so long_ for me to show Mulder I love him because I'm scared to trust again, to let go of my heart...

And then I walked up to the hospital room and I saw Maggie and I was too afraid, not wanting her to see me, ducking away...and then I saw Daniel laying in that bed and he looked so much older, much weaker than I'd ever thought he would...those past feelings came rushing through and I stood there, his hair more gray with a single tear running down his face...I didn't want to see him...I was going to push him back out of mind until she called...

"You came to see him," Maggie said on the phone.

"I'm sorry, who is this?", I asked, standing near my window at home.

"Margaret Waterston," she said.

"Maggie...Is everything alright? "

"That depends doesn't it."

"I'm sorry?"

"Whatever," she spoke. "Dr. Kopeikan told my father that you were here and now he wants to see you."

"About what?", I asked.

"Look," she said angrily. "He asked me to call so I'm calling..."

"I don't know...I don't Maggie, " I stuttered. "I don't know if I have the time..."

"Don't know if you have the time," she sneered.

The phone had beeped. "Maggie, can you hold on, I have another call coming through."

"Look...Listen," she began. "But if you come, it doesn't mean I accept you being in his life...", she said hanging up.

Mulder had interrupted Thank God...he was good at that. But I was still angry with him and confused about the Maggie/Daniel situation so I was short with him but when I told him 'I'd try for him', I meant more than what he thought...I could never say no to Mulder, I don't know why but I never wanted to disappoint him and even though picking up some papers for him was the last thing I wanted to do I knew I would...of course, but it also meant that I would be going in the direction of Daniel...near the hospital...and that meant inviting my past into the present...


	2. Chapter 2

Fate in a Trenchcoat2

By Trycee

Standing in the hallway of the hospital, I told myself to just do it, just walk through the door but when I entered I was caught off guard...wrong room...alright, get brave again, deal with your demons...my feet dragged a little until I got to his room. He noticed me first and I noticed Maggie. She pushed past me exiting and I stood there a second...at that moment I wasn't Dr. Scully...I wasn't Special Agent Scully...I was a Home wrecker, the Mistress all over again...

When I entered the room with Daniel, I felt like that young girl all over again...not in love, no, but I felt like when he looked at me I was still in my early twenties, still looking to him for the answers...after bantering with him a bit, I asked how he happened to be in Washington and then he grabbed my hand...his hands felt familiar, colder, older, and uncomfortable but I tried my best to hide that as I laid my hand in his. He gripped my hand tighter, I could tell he was looking for a ring and didn't find one...I sat down as he continued holding my hand, it no longer fit, my hand in his but I was trying to be polite...

"How's the FBI?", he asked, still holding my hand as I tried tactfully to remove it but he wouldn't let go.

"Is that why you wanted to see me?", I asked. "To remind me once again what a bad choice I made? "

He pressed my hand to his mouth and then rubbed it against his face. "Believe me my motivation is far more selfish then that."

I sighed, "You scare me Daniel..." He finally let go of my hand. "I know," he said, visibly hurt by my words. "I scare you...because I represented that which is ingrained not only in your mind but in your heart... that which you secretly longed for..."

"You never accepted my reason for leaving...", I told him.

"There was no reason, it was an excuse," he said, bitterly.

I looked at him then, all the memories brought up to the surface. "But you understood why," I continued.

"I can't believe the FBI is a passion...not like medicine."

I knew he would think that of course...it was the same reasoning he had given me trying to convince me to stay with him despite Maggie's feelings of betrayal. I stood up then, "I'm sorry I came..."

He touched my face and rubbed his fingers against my cheek. He used to do that and it made me weak, now his touch_ was_ weak and I felt nothing, not like when Mulder touched my face. "I just wanted to make sure you were okay," I said, without looking at him. He saw that his touch no longer worked and he saw the pain in my eyes. "I know how difficult it must've been for you...just walking through that door. But you wouldnt have come if you didn't want too."

My head had been down but I raised it at that. "That says something doesn't it...", he continued. But as I stood there looking into his eyes I wondered if I did want to be there or not...so much in my life had changed but standing there with Daniel it was as if all the accomplishments in my life never existed. I was standing in his shadow...

When I jumped into my car, Mulder called me. I was relieved to hear his voice actually. He said he had the address of the woman, Colleen who researched crop circles and he wanted me to... and then I saw her, I nearly hit her...the woman in the trench coat. I slammed on my brakes barely missing her and as I sat there in the car, a truck plowed past where if I hadn't seen the woman, the truck would've struck me possibly killing me. I turned back towards the woman in the trench coat and she turned to smile at me. I sat there a moment...there was something strange in that woman...I nearly hit her and she turns to smile at me? But if not for her I would have been killed...how odd. I could hear Mulder's voice, I had dropped the phone...

After meeting Colleen, Mulder's contact and realizing we had seen each other in the hospital when I mistakenly walked into the wrong room, and after brushing off her crop circle research and her mumble jumble about slowing down..._right_...it was like time stopped as the papers she handed me fell all over the front stoop...time just slowed...and as I gathered the papers I saw the Heart Chakra and I don't know why it stood out to me...I'd seen hundreds of crop circle photos working with Mulder, we'd even investigated a few that turned out to be bogus, but for some reason that photo struck me...spoke to me, if thats even possible. My phone rang and I found myself right back at Daniels hospital room, with Maggie standing there and Dr. Kopeikan.


	3. Chapter 3

Fate in a Trench coat 3

by Trycee

"Ah, hurricane Scully has arrived..." Daniel said.

"I was summoned, " I said angrily.

I barely heard him, I was waiting for Maggie to tear out of the room but she stayed a bit, not looking at me. I couldn't help but look at her. I finally tuned in to the words, 'Prednisone'.

At that Maggie and Dr. Kopeikan looked at me. I gave my opinion on using it and it was NOT appreciated by either of them. I could see Maggie's face tightening, her mouth forming words she hadn't spoken as Dr. Kopeikan glared at me. He walked off leaving me to face Maggie. She had a smirk on her face, "You come off so rational," she said, looking directly at me her arms crossed. "But maybe you know less than you think." She glanced once at her father and walked past me.

I didn't know what to say..."She's so..." I whispered, my gaze on the floor.

"She's been through some difficult times," he answered. "She's very angry."

Well obviously I thought. "How did she even find out?", I said. I knew she had caught us but it was like she was tipped off, I always wondered.

"There's things you don't know," he said lying in the bed. I stood a few feet away my hands on my hips. "Things I'm not proud of," he continued.

I walked closer to him, "What things," I asked.

"I screwed up Dana. Things got bad at home after..."

Nervously I looked behind me as if I expected her to be there. I sat down, the weight of it all too heavy. "Bad how?"

"I haven't been completely honest with you," he continued. "It was hard for me...when you walked away...I shut down from my family...needless to say it was very difficult for Barbara..."

Her name stung me, my heart ripped..."You're divorced?" 

"Yeah, it was a terminal period of discomfort for us both..."

"Where did you go?"

He turned to look at me. "Here...Washington."

"When?", I asked surprised.

"Almost 10 yrs ago..."

"Daniel...", I whispered, tears starting to form in my eyes. "You didn't move here for me?"

I didn't even hear what he said, only the words 'of course I did' and the realization of it struck me. "Oh god...", I said, shaking my head. My face reddened and the tears began to fall. "I've come at such a strange time..."

"I know..." he mumbled. "You have a life?"

"I don't know what I have," I said, tears streaming down my face. I had said it out loud, I wasn't sure what Mulder and I had...I laughed nervously, looking up at the ceiling as if the answer were up there. "I mean...your X-rays were in the wrong envelope, I wouldn't even known you were here if it weren't for a mix up," I continued to avoid his eyes. "Its just...", I sighed, finally looking at him, tears continuing to fall.

"What do you want Dana?", he asked, catching me off guard.

I shook my head slightly, "I want everything I should want at this time in my life...", I said breathing heavily. "Maybe, I want the life I didn't choose..."

He reached out his hand and I stared at it a few minutes. I touched his hand and tears starting falling, he gripped it, and I laid my head on his chest, trying not to cry, trying not to remember those dreams I had that will never come true..._children_...I closed my eyes as he stroked my hair. I raised up slightly...this was different, this didn't feel right...he wasn't Mulder...but I laid my head back down, feeling contact with skin I barely received anymore...that which I longed for so much and used to have prior to him breaking my heart and thats when his heart stopped.


	4. Chapter 4

Fate in a Trench Coat 4

by Trycee

I just remember jumping into action, trying to save Daniels life...I was working on pure adrenaline. I had been lying there on his chest, my eyes closed, willing myself to sleep, and I heard the beeps of the monitor and I knew he was in trouble. What happened after that was a blur...

I went back to Colleen's house...Mulder wasn't there and I needed to talk to someone...I just had this feeling I needed to speak to her...I was struck by the religious artifacts in her home...it was so bright, intriguing. Being a Catholic though I had no ideal what these Eastern religious relics were...all the lines, the symmetry...wood contrasting with metals and ceramics...it was breathless...

Talking with Colleen I was surprised to find out she too had been a scientist. Its not easy for me to go past that, I've been trying for years to open my mind and I've glimpsed some amazing things, unexplainable but I still remain a skeptic, its important to our relationship, Mulder's and I that I be the rational minded one...I balance him out... I listened as she told me her story about fear of what others would think about her relationship to a woman...I was thinking about how it must've looked for Daniel and I too be together back then...how odd a pairing we made...I was his daughters age...something about that now struck me as wrong, purely wrong in a way it didn't before... When she said that when we hold on to fear, shame, and guilt referring to Daniels heart condition, I thought she was speaking to me as well...I've held on to that guilt for more years than I'd like to remember.

"It creates imbalance," Colleen had explained. "It makes us forget who we are."

But what really struck me as strange was when I was standing in her kitchen playing with some metal statue of whatever it was as she made us tea and she mentioned out of the blue about time standing still. How odd that I had just experienced that several times now. Her answer about Daniels sickness was something like what my sister Melissa would've said...I used to dismiss Missy but for some reason it rang true this time when Colleen said it...I wasn't sure if it was true or not but it just _felt_ true..."Everything happens for a reason," she had said.

I grabbed some flowers and raced back to the hospital, I needed to talk about the past with him, get out my feelings about the shame I felt, talk about his shame... I walked in to find Maggie standing in the hallway distraught.

"Are you happy," she said approaching me, her eyes blazing.

"I'm sorry? I...I was just going up to see your father", I said, barely able to look her in the eye.

"You can't! He's in a coma!"

"Since when?"

"Since about two minutes after you _supposedly _saved his life!"

I tried to rush to him but she stood in my way. I stopped and my eyes hit the floor.

"Did you have any ideal the hell you created in our lives?", she confronted me.

"Maggie, to be honest, I left so there wouldn't be any hell in your lives," I said finally looking at her directly.

She stood in front of me, her hands on her hips. "Don't try to be reasonable with me. I am so sick of trying to be reasonable! You moved on but we've had to live with what you left behind!", she said, storming past me out the door.

As I walked out of the hospital, time again slowed down...I was walking unaware of where I was going really...when I stopped walking I noticed a sign swinging...I was in China town...time slowed even more and then I saw her...the woman in the trench coat walking...I started running towards her...and was struck by a bicyclist. I sped up trying to catch up to this mysterious woman and stood at the brown door she had entered. I opened it cautiously and walked inside and was immediately greeted by greenery all around, it was a temple of some kind with large doors, where they led I did not know. I pushed the door open and again was struck at the beauty of it. There were cushions on the floor, candles, bright blue lights streaming down from the ceiling and a gigantic statue of Buddha against the back wall. I walked in, looking all around me and I walked right up towards the blue lights. I could see the Golden Buddha statue, it was extraordinary and I had chills go through me. I don't know why I knelt down, its the Catholic in me that kneels when in awe of the miraculous I guess, but I suddenly started rocking my head back and forth, rocking until my head was underneath the blue streaming lights. When I did reach underneath it, I saw a golden vision, flashes of images...my fathers funeral, my father in his uniform visiting me when I was dying, Mulder, Melissa, myself, Mulder again...Collen...Emily...Mulder and me...and then I saw Daniel naked, his body shriveled up, and his heart was beating...and I could see inside his heart, he was mouthing something and then his eyes opened to look at me...

I sighed loudly opening my eyes and I was back in the temple...like a journey, I had gone on a journey...I was shaken. I looked around but no one else was there and then I looked back at the Buddha...


	5. Chapter 5

Fate in a Trench Coat 5

by Trycee

Colleen stood in the back of the hospital room, a healer was standing over Daniel, and I stood next to Colleen, nervously pacing the floor and listening to him explain his method of healing, something I was very unfamiliar with. Dr. Kopeikan came in, "Dr. Scully, who do you think you are?"

"We have nothing but Dr. Waterston's welfare in mind here," I said.

Offended he said to me, "You're not his doctor."

"I understand that. Whats taking place here is an alternative approach, " I said barely able to get the words out of my own mouth.

He looked at Daniel and then back at me. "Whats taking place here is a waste of time, Dr. Scully. And I think that Dr. Waterston would be the first to agree with me. Have you considered that?"

"I just wanted to help him, " I said, looking into Dr. Kopeikans eyes. "It seemed like nothing else was working."

"All due respect, " he said, pointing at me. "That is not for you to access. Its for me or Dr. Waterston's family to decide."

I nearly jumped when I heard her voice behind me. "Then let them continue," she said.

I turned to face Maggie, she walked right up to me and Dr. Kopeikan. "If it isn't hurting him, we should at least be open to it," she said to the doctor. She turned to look at me and I was grateful but I saw something in her eyes...that of an old friend, the one I had betrayed. The healer chimed in, "I'm afraid theres nothing more I can do at this time. This man quite frankly is ready to move on...but something seems to be holding him back. Unfinished business is binding him to the physical plane...something he needs to release...before he can let go."

I nervously looked towards Maggie and she met my gaze. I knew it was me...I knew it was me... I went home still in a daze, I took a shower and tried to make myself some tea but it all seemed unreal, like a dream...I must've been dreaming because I saw myself going to Daniels bedside but when I looked at him I saw myself looking like I did throughout my cancer...I jolted out of bed and the phone was ringing, it was Maggie telling me she needed me to come to the hospital right away. She hung up before I could find out why.

I was very shocked when I saw Daniel sitting in the bed..."You were slipping away, no one thought you'd come out of this. I'm still in shock."

"Imagine my shock when my doctor told me about the voodoo ritual you'd arranged for last night. "

"I was afraid it didn't work," I said, nervously.

"Of course it didn't work, don't be absurd! Where'd you get this crap?"

I looked at him then. "Daniel that 'crap' may have just saved your life. Whether your open to it or not!"

He shook his head. "That doesn't matter, I don't want to talk about that."

I looked off, my mind on Mulder. "Look at me, " he demanded. "I'm gonna get well. We need to talk about what happens next for us."

"I spoke at length to Maggie," I told him. He looked away from me. "Its time, time that you took responsibility for the hurt you caused in your family. Its no accident that you got sick, Daniel. You've been running from the truth for 10 yrs."

He shook his head more, "Dana, it was all to be with you, " he whispered. "You were all I lived for..."

A tear was forming in my eye, "Maybe the reason you're alive now is to make up for that."

Maggie and I had sat for more than an hour talking about our past friendship and the betrayal I had caused her. I had asked her to forgive me for what I'd done and when she told me she forgave me the weight on my heart lifted. I felt freed...but now it was time to tell Daniel how I felt.

"Make it up to Maggie, " I continued.

He laughed. "Thats Maggie talking not you..."

"No!", I said staunchly. He looked confused. "I'm not the same person Daniel. I wouldn't have known that had I not seen you again."

I turned behind me and found Maggie standing there. I looked one last time back at Daniel and I turned and walked away...

I sat outside the hospital, time again slowing down, half in shock and half proud of myself for finally **exorcising** my demons, I felt free, freer than I had in many years...I wasn't afraid anymore...and thats when I saw her again, the woman in the trench coat walking. I jumped up to catch her this time..."Excuse me, " I yelled, turning her shoulder around and I was shocked again...there stood Mulder in a trench coat and a hat just like the woman...How did that happen? I was surprise, elated, but still so very shocked. He explained to me that there 'was nothing to find in England, no case, a big waste of time' as he put it.

I sighed. "Maybe sometimes nothing happens for a reason."

He looked surprised. "What does that supposed to mean?"

I smiled. "Nothing...come on I'll make you some tea..."

We ordered a pizza and I spent the time curled up right next to him, telling him everything that happened...this was a first for us, I typically held back my past relationships, my experiences with unknown phenomenon but this time I told it all...I felt so close to him, I wanted to be close to him but I feel asleep right next to him. He apparently had wrapped me in the blanket on his couch but he had picked me up and placed me in his bed...but he didn't leave me there this time, instead I woke up to him kissing me softly like he had been waiting for a moment like this all of his life. I knew he couldn't resist...I couldn't resist either and I didn't want too anymore...I knew he was the one, the only one and I didn't have anything to fear anymore, I didn't need to hold back, there was no other choice for me, he was it, my all...


End file.
